THE SPOILT CHILD OF THE LAW.
[To THZ EDITOR OF THE "SPIICTATOR.".1 SIR,—I have read with interest and with no little amusement your article on October 6th, and the two letters which followed it on October 13th, on the legal position of the married woman in respect of her responsibility for her own and her husband's debts. Here is a set of laws made wholly by men sitting in Parliaments elected entirely by men. According to your showing, these laws extend undue favour to married women, and afford endless opportunities to them, if they happen to be dishonest, to cheat their creditors. I can never admit that it is to the advantage of any set of persons, male or female, to have cheating made safe and easy for them. Therefore, instead of looking upon these laws as an advantage, I must regard them as a serious disadvantage, in so far as they actually operate at all. And in this view almost every one must surely concur. What, then, can have been the intention of Parliament in framing the laws of which you complain. It was not the desire to demoralise intirried women by making cheating easy for them. It is just as unlikely that Parliament acted under the spell of uxorious infatuation, for the rest of the laws touching the status of married women (as regards their children and their inheritance of property, for example) show no touch of this. Nor does it seem likely that these laws are due to pure stupidity and blundering. Some other solution than these must be looked for. Is it not probable that Parliament was actuated by the desire which many men feel, especially those who are engaged in speculative and hazardous enter- prises, to have some safe fund so settled and tied up that in the event of financial crash it cannot become the property of their creditors ? I believe this key will be found to fit the lock, and that the mystery is really no mystery at all, but only an instance of- " Not for thy sake, 0 woman, but for mine."
—I am, Sir, &c., MILLICENT GARRETT FAWCETT.
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